Mesh and Lace
by dottsie
Summary: Tony elaborates on his fashion choices. Violet elaborates on her secret identity. Hands will be held. / Spoilers for Incredibles 2, canon compliant.


"Do you want to come to the beach with me and my family this weekend?"

The question had just slipped out. Sentences and questions often slipped out of Violet's mouth around Tony. He had that effect on her.

She asked him this while they were sitting on a bench after school, their backpacks beside them silently warding off any other students who might want to say 'hi'. The bags took up the remaining space on the seat, leaving Violet and Tony in the middle. This was a ritual they had begun a couple weeks after Violet introduced herself; it always let them get a few moments alone to spend with each other every day, no matter what their other plans were.

Violet had been working up the nerve to ask Tony along on her family's weekend trip all day. She figured it was appropriate, right? They had been going steady for a little over two months. That was an alright time to ask him something like that, since the beach itself was only a half hour away. It wasn't a big trip, by any means.

But she had begun to get nervous about it during the last period of the school day (it _had_ to be a big milestone), and the fact that Tony didn't say 'yes' immediately once she had finally gotten the question out wasn't helping.

His initial response was more of an "Uhhh..." and a blank glance across the school courtyard.

Violet laughed uneasily, not conscious of her own nervous habit. "I mean, it's cool if you don't want to, it's not _really_ hot enough out now since summer's not here, my family _is_ kind of crazy trying to go this time of year, I just figured I'd throw an invitation out just in case-"

Tony seemed to realize how he had reacted to the question, and quickly shook his head, his face sheepish. "No, no, it's not that I don't want to. I, uh..."

Violet paused. "Are you going to be busy?"

"No, I'm not going to be busy. It's just..." Tony bit his lip like he was trying to think of what to say.

"It's really okay if you don't want to go."

He looked at her, his expression vaguely reminiscent of a puppy. "I promise it's not that, Vi."

She blinked in response. Her heart's pumping was distracting.

He fiddled his thumbs. "It hasn't got anything to do with you, I promse." He idly pushed a rock on the ground with the toe of his shoe. "I guess I should be honest about it, huh?"

Violet tilted her head, unsure of how to respond. "Tony?"

"I just don't really like wearing swimsuits, that's all. I've got, a, uhh... I've got a scar on my chest from when I was little." Tony's eyes cast downward as if he were ashamed. "People would see it if I went to the beach."

Violet's anxiety rate decreased instantaneously, and her shoulders dropped as they released all their tension. "Is that all?"

Tony looked up, his eyes a bit bigger than normal. "Huh?"

"Is it just a scar? Tony, nobody's going to make fun of you." Her voice tone wasn't frustrated; she was being genuine.

He shrugged. "It's a pretty bad one."

She frowned in concern as she felt her inner super coming out. "Does it hurt you? Did someone hurt you?"

"No, no. Well, yeah, but... not on purpose." Tony smiled at her in an attempt to reassure her, but he only smiled with his mouth; his eyes weren't smiling. His eyes were a bit distant. However, his voice came out as good-natured as it always did. "It's no big deal. It's something that happened a long time ago."

Violet knew Tony well enough by now to know he was trying to play it off. They had been going steady for two whole months, and she had known him longer than he had known her due to the NSA's meddling; she could tell when he was lying about being alright. He made the same face when she had to call off their dates, but _that_ situation was something that was _Violet's_ fault, in her mind (even though that wasn't true). This was different. It was an insecurity of his.

She shook her head. "It must be a big deal to you, since you cover it up all the time. Do you feel embarrassed about it or something?"

"I don't know." He sighed. "Maybe a little, sometimes. But like I said, it was a long time ago."

Violet reached to hold his hand. She was not buying it. "Listen, you haven't got to come to the beach if you don't want to, but however bad that scar is, I bet I've got you beat in terms of embarrassing secrets."

God, why did she say that? She was just trying to make him feel better, and it just came out. Her parents would kill her. She felt her face getting hot, and she cleared her throat to try and distract herself. The memory of him seeing her in her super suit before his mind was wiped was resurfacing, and that was NOT helpful right now.

Tony chuckled. "You wanna bet? I don't wanna freak you out or anything."

She smiled to indicate she didn't intend her reply as a challenge, but a lighthearted response. "I think I can handle it."

He rubbed his thumb across the top of her hand, some of the tension in his face dissolving. "Well, you know how my moms adopted me?"

"Mmhmm."

"It's, uh… it's cause my birth parents didn't take care of me the way they should have." He rubbed the back of his neck. "I've never met my father, and my mother was bitter about him not being there. I think she was so bitter that she sometimes kind of forgot that I was just a kid."

Violet's reassuring smile had disappeared, replaced by a frown. She stared at Tony's face, her eyes sad and his eyes facing the ground.

He shrugged again. "I remember living with her, but it wasn't for very long. I wasn't more than five. She dropped a pot of boiling water one day, and it got on me. Burned most of my chest, down one of my arms and my stomach, and up to part of my neck."

He pulled the neck on his sweater down, and sure enough, there on his skin lingered a dry, pinkish burn scar. It didn't reach up high enough for Violet to see much of it, but it definitely would have been visible without Tony's signature turtleneck. She understood why he wore those so often now.

Tony let go of the turtleneck and it returned to its previous position. "That wasn't the first time she had been careless around me, but it was the biggest. So after that, I went to a foster home, and not too long after that is when my moms found me. I was lucky. I _am_ lucky. Most foster kids don't get adopted so quickly, and to such good parents."

Violet found her throat closing up. "I'm sorry."

Tony's eyes met hers again. He smiled at her, genuinely this time, letting her know he was okay. "I'm alright, really. It's a little hard to talk about sometimes, but, honestly, I almost never think about it. I have so many good friends now, and I have my family. And you." He put his free hand over the girl's hand he was holding.

"I… I'm sorry. I know I _just_ said that, but I'm sorry." Violet wanted to speak his past out of existence, but she couldn't do that no matter how many times she said sorry.

Now, Violet couldn't get the image of Tony's face in that parking lot out of her head. The city was roaring and crumbling around her, but all she had been able to focus on at that exact moment was Tony. His face had looked nearly the same that day as it did when he was recounting his past just a minute ago. Afraid.

Her brain felt like it was made of fog.

Which is why she completely disregarded worrying what her parents would think about her next question.

"I guess it's fair I tell you that embarrassing secret of mine, too, huh?"

Violet looked over her shoulder to check for passers-by, saw that she and Tony were far enough away from people for her to feel comfortable, and then back at Tony.

His eyebrows drooped as he said, "Aw, Violet, you haven't got to if you don't want to. It's not like you owe me or anything."

Violet shook her head and placed her hand on top of his. Their hands were now stacked together, alternating like a hand-holding sandwich, which she would have found funny during any other conversation. "Yeah, I do."

"No, Vi, you–"

She shushed him; it wasn't a harsh shush, but a calm one. He obliged and looked at her with his smile crooked to one side.

Violet took a deep breath. Her eyes darted around again, and then she shut them.

She willed her hand to turn invisible from the wrist down, and she felt it vanish from sight.

Her skin always felt a little bit different when she was invisible. Not anything major, but it was like the atoms in her skin cells were shaking around a bit, making themselves sparse. Indescribable to anyone who hadn't experienced it.

Violet opened her eyes, glancing at Tony expectantly. He was still looking up at her. He hadn't noticed the change. He was still waiting for her to say something.

She cast her eyes down to their hands, which now looked like three instead of four. Violet's topmost hand had vanished.

Her eyes went back up to Tony, her eyebrows raising with them. He furrowed his brow, and looked like he was about to ask what was going on, but he caught a glimpse of their hands before he got a chance.

He stared.

Neither of them made any movement for a few moments.

Violet's throat was quickly becoming dry. Already regretting her decision, she thought about how she should have told him about one of the several times she had nearly died, instead. Those were true, and they _were_ secrets, but they wouldn't necessarily reveal her powers. Those stories wouldn't put her in jeopardy of moving again. Mr. Dicker's mind wiping protocol had frustrated her to tears, but it had protected her family.

Yep, the worry was coming back. Why was her impulse control so bad when it came to this boy?

She made her hand visible again. The voice that came out of her mouth was half a whisper. "Tony?"

Tony hadn't stopped staring at her hand. "You're a…"

Violet bit her tongue on purpose. "Yeah."

"That's… wow." He adjusted his fingers that were resting beneath hers, and she could feel every muscle and tendon. "Can you do it again?"

She didn't respond for a second, but eventually found the strength to reply, "Sure."

So, she did it again.

This time, he lifted his hand up so that his fingers intertwined with her invisible ones. He seemed to be amazed thay he could feel and touch something that didn't look like it was there, affectionately playing with her hand in a way that made her insides turn to butterflies. Drawing circles in her palm with his thumb and things like that.

Tony finally made eye contact with her again. "That's amazing."

"Really?" She kicked herself for sounding so lovestruck.

"Yeah, really." He seemed just as lost for words as she was. "It's… wow. _Wow._ "

She made herself fully visible again. "You can't tell anyone. Not even my family. They'd kill me if they knew I told you about our secret."

His face was the definition of awe. "Your family's super, too?"

"I– they–" She withdrew her hands and buried her face in them. "Crap."

Tony held back for a second, and then gently grabbed Violet's shoulders. "Hey, don't worry. I won't tell anyone. Not a single person."

Violet peeked out from the top of her fingers. "Promise?"

"Promise. I wouldn't put you or your family in danger like that."

"Thanks." She exhaled, but it was shaky.

Tony folded his hands in his lap. His voice nearly cracked when he spoke. "Well… you've definitely got me beat in the secrets category, I'd say."

Violet laughed in the way that someone holding back tears laughs when they're being cheered up – short and hopeful. "And I think your scar is great. Uh, not the circumstances, but you know what I mean. You shouldn't be ashamed of it." She smiled sadly at him. "And thanks for trusting me enough to tell me about it. You didn't have to do that, either."

Tony tugged at the neck of his sweater like he always did when Violet managed to fluster him. "Well, I trust you. And you can trust me, you know."

Violet adjusted herself so she was facing forward, allowing her to rest her head on his shoulder. "I know I can."

Tony wrapped his arm around her and waved at a friend passing by. "So... the beach, huh?"

"Are you in?"

"I think I am, yeah."


End file.
